Public Service Announcement – Don’t Order This

Why I even decided to go to Bob Evans in the first place is completely beyond me. Blame it on a momentary lapse of reason. I had my two girls and one of their BFFs and we were headed to see The Squeakquel.

Yes, this is a horror story.

Anyway, I needed to feed this crew plus have money for 4 movie tickets, popcorn, and sodas. Thus, my oddball decision to eat lunch at Blob Evans, as I “lovingly” call it. They do have a lot of kid’s meals to choose from for $2.99 and I hoped I could get something diet-friendly for me.

I am not even going to get started on the crappy service we got at the Teays Valley location – first, because the manager did try to make it right and second, that’s not the focus of this PSA. I want to talk about my food.

One of my more regrettable food choices, the chicken, spinach and tomato pasta from the Fit From the Farm Menu was listed as:

Chicken, Spinach & Tomato Pasta

The first thing I noticed was the odd smell. I could not identify what was disturbing me about the aroma. Was it the spinach? Maybe. Whatever it was, it was not appealing. It was indeed a small portion, but I fully expected that. Three or four small pieces of white meat chicken sat atop the pasta. Some sauteed spinach leaves were present as well as some very tiny diced tomatoes. Upon tasting, I determined the chicken HAD to be microwaved. You know how leftover chicken tastes when you nuke it a little too long for lunch the next day at work and you wished you had ordered Main Kwong with the rest of the office instead of eating what you brought? Well, that’s how it tasted.

Whatever the weird smell was, it also lended an odd taste to this dish. The tomatoes were so tiny, I could barely taste them. I dislike slimy cooked spinach so I picked around most of that. On the bright side, the pasta was not overcooked and had only a small amount of oil on it – although I could not taste the fruitiness of olive oil. You could easily convince me it was either a low grade of olive oil or canola oil instead.

I neither saw nor tasted any evidence of parmesan cheese.

I was hungry and did not want to go crazy on popcorn at the theatre, so I powered through this meal. When the server asked me how it was – it was a new addition to the menu – I responded with a slow and deliberate shake of my head. “Not good”, I replied. “I know it’s supposed to be low-calorie but there was no flavor whatsoever.” Unless you count the odd smell/taste as a flavor.

Bob, if you want some ideas on how to improve this dish without adding many calories, you could try:

Add some steamed vegetables

Lemon zest

Actually putting the parmesan cheese on it

Garlic

Flavor that bland chicken with garlic and/or rosemary

You, dear reader…stay away from this dish if you experience temporary insanity and find yourself at a Bob Evans. Just wave goodbye to your diet and order a stack of hotcakes instead – they’re great!

P.S. Grub Grade has a story about the Fit From the Farm Menu on their site – read it by clicking here.

One response to “Public Service Announcement – Don’t Order This”

No use asking Bob to fix it; he passed away a couple of years ago or so. Don’t know if he ever ate at his restaurants. Kanawha City and one in Florida always brought out the soup within moments of ordering and the turkey dinner followed a minute later. (Except for the time the meal was brought out BEFORE the soup.) Now, the only time I eat there is if someone gave me a gift card for Christmas.